[EL] ELB News and Commentary 4/17/13

Tue Apr 16 21:12:23 PDT 2013

    "How Congress Quietly Overhauled Its Insider-Trading Law"
    <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49368>

Posted on April 16, 2013 9:01 pm <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49368> 
by Rick Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

NPR 
<http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2013/04/16/177496734/how-congress-quietly-overhauled-its-insider-trading-law>:

    To understand how the law changed, I asked Holman to meet me in the
    basement of the Cannon House Office Building.

    "This is where the public records are kept, for those who can handle
    traveling to Washington, D.C.," Holman explained.

    That's right. If you want to look up the financial disclosure forms
    filed by high-level congressional staffers --- say, to find out
    whether they've been using the privileges of their positions to make
    well-timed stock trades --- you have to come to this office.

    Holman showed me how it works. You have to enter your name and
    address into a computer, and then you can search. But you have to
    know the name of the person you are searching for. If he or she has
    filed a financial disclosure form, it will come up as a PDF, which
    you can print at a cost of 10 cents a page.

    "The database itself is almost meaningless," says Holman. He says
    the only option for those who want to get a comprehensive look at
    what some 2,900 staffers have filed is to review the cases one by
    one. "And that's just too big a job for anybody to do."

    The STOCK Act was supposed to make this task significantly easier.
    Records for members of Congress, the executive branch and their
    staffs were supposed to be posted online in a searchable, sortable
    and downloadable format.

    If you wanted to see who traded health care stock just before a
    committee acted on a health care bill, it would be easy. No trips to
    the basement required.

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Posted in conflict of interest laws <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=20> 
| Comments Off

    "Florida Senate Republicans crack down on foreign-language
    interpreters for voting" <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49365>

Posted on April 16, 2013 8:36 pm <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49365> 
by Rick Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Marc Caputo 
<http://miamiherald.typepad.com/nakedpolitics/2013/04/florida-senate-cracks-down-on-foreign-language-interpreters-for-voting.html>:

    Desiline Victor, the 102-year-old North Miami voter who became a
    symbol of Florida's elections woes, could again find it tough to
    cast a ballot now that the Republican-controlled state Senate voted
    Tuesday to keep a crack down on foreign-language interpreters at the
    polls.

    The Senate maintained the last-minute measure on what appeared to be
    a party-line voice vote while debating a bill designed to reverse
    the effects of an election law that helped create long lines and
    suppress the vote in 2012.

Two questions: (1) This is the new outreach to Latino voters? (2) This 
is the response to make lines /shorter/ at the polls in Florida?

I expect a successful federal lawsuit against such a provision if it 
gets included in a new Florida election law.

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Posted in election administration <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=18>, 
The Voting Wars <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=60>, voting 
<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=31>, Voting Rights Act 
<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=15> | Comments Off

    "Levin Promises to Investigate 501(c)(4)s Using Secret Money to Fund
    Campaigns" <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49360>

Posted on April 16, 2013 7:57 pm <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49360> 
by Rick Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Bloomberg BNA 
<http://news.bna.com/mpdm/MPDMWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=30373624&vname=mpebulallissues&jd=a0d7k5h8b7&split=0>:  
"One of retiring Sen. Carl Levin's (D-Mich.) last objectives in Congress 
will be to investigate the use of secret money to fund political 
campaigns, with the Internal Revenue Service on the hot seat."

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Posted in campaign finance <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10>, tax law 
and election law <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=22> | Comments Off

    "In Defense of Citizens United" <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49357>

Posted on April 16, 2013 7:51 pm <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49357> 
by Rick Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Judge/Professor Michael McConnell has postedthis draft 
<http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2241682>on SSRN 
(forthcoming Yale Law Journal). Here is the abstract:

    Citizens United v. FEC is one of the most reviled decisions of the
    Supreme Court in recent years. The President of the United States
    denounced it to the Justices' faces at his 2011 State of the Union
    address. His 2008 opponent, John McCain, called it "the worst
    decision ever." The Democratic Party is pledged to reverse it by
    constitutional amendment if necessary. Prominent newspapers
    attribute to it virtually every excess of the campaign finance
    system, whether or not the practices were authorized by the decision
    or would have been lawful even without it. It has become shorthand
    for corporate domination of politics. It has few defenders among
    legal scholars. I believe it is time for a more balanced evaluation.

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Posted in campaign finance <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10>, Supreme 
Court <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=29> | Comments Off

    Justice Scalia, Commenting on Pending Case, Calls Voting Rights Act
    "Racial Preferment" <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49355>

Posted on April 16, 2013 7:50 pm <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49355> 
by Rick Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Jess Bravin 
<http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424127887324345804578427023243667626-lMyQjAxMTAzMDEwNjExNDYyWj.html>:

    Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia told university students that
    key provisions of the Voting Rights Act had evolved from an
    emergency response to racial discrimination in 1965 to an "embedded"
    form of "racial preferment" that would likely continue indefinitely
    unless the court acts to end them.

    Justice Scalia, speaking Monday night at the University of
    California Washington Center, elaborated on remarks he made in
    February during Supreme Court arguments over the act's Section 5,
    which requires states and localities that historically discriminated
    against minority voters to obtain federal approval to change
    election procedures.

    Section 5 functions as a racial entitlement because the federal
    government doesn't take a similar interest in protecting the voting
    rights of white people from racial discrimination, Justice Scalia said.

The remarks are not much different from what Justice Scalia said at oral 
argument 
<http://blog.sfgate.com/nov05election/2013/03/20/scalia-calls-voting-rights-act-racial-entitlement/> 
in the /Shelby County/ case, but I find it pretty remarkable that he'd 
make these comments off the bench while /Shelby County /remains pending.

UPDATE:It gets worse 
<http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2013/04/16/scalia-speaks-part-i-justice-tips-hand-on-fcc-case-vote/>, 
as Justice Scalia appears to tip his hand on how he's voting in an 
upcoming case.

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Posted in Supreme Court <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=29>, Voting 
Rights Act <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=15> | Comments Off

    Campbell Debate on Campaign Finance Reform
    <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49352>

Posted on April 16, 2013 1:36 pm <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49352> 
by Rick Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Details <http://www.maxwell.syr.edu/campbell/programs/Upcoming_Debate/>:

    April 18, 2013

    U.S. Navy Memorial Naval Heritage Center

    Washington D.C.

    5:45 PM

      This Assembly Believes the Current System of Campaign Finance Is
      Broken

*For the proposition* 	*Against the proposition*
*Marc Elias
*Partner, Perkins Coie, general counsel, Kerry-Edwards 2004 campaign, 
general counsel, Dodd 2008 primary campaign, lead counsel, Franken 2008 
recount 	*David Mason
*Senior Vice President, Aristotle, former Commissioner and Chair, 
Federal Election Commission
*Robert Edgar
*President, Common Cause, former General Secretary of the National 
Council of the Churches of Christ, former Member of Congress (D-Pa.). 
*Benjamin Barr
*Counsel, Wyoming Liberty Group, counsel in Carey v. FEC and Free Speech 
v. FEC.

/*Space is limited and registration is required*/

*Please register here <https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/5ZWD6G3>*

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Posted in campaign finance <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10> | 
Comments Off

    Sam Bagenstos Defends DOJ, Tom Perez
    <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49348>

Posted on April 16, 2013 1:33 pm <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49348> 
by Rick Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Testimony here 
<http://judiciary.house.gov/hearings/113th/04162013_2/Bagenstos%2004162013.pdf>.

You can find links to the other witness testimony at the House hearing 
at this link 
<http://judiciary.house.gov/hearings/113th/hear_04162013_2.html>.

UPDATE: Watch this exchange 
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=q127wuWffVo#%21> 
between Rep. Gowdy and Prof. Bagenstos about the South Carolina 
preclearance process and whether career attorneys were overruled in the 
case.

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Posted in Department of Justice <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=26>, 
election administration <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=18>, The Voting 
Wars <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=60>, Voting Rights Act 
<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=15> | Comments Off

    "SEC: More than 500,000 Calls for Corporate Spending Disclosure"
    <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49345>

Posted on April 16, 2013 11:18 am <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49345> 
by Rick Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Bloomberg reports 
<http://go.bloomberg.com/political-capital/2013-04-16/sec-more-than-500000-calls-for-corporate-spending-disclosure/>.

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Posted in campaign finance <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10> | 
Comments Off

    "In Political Campaigns, Do You Get What You Pay For?"
    <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49342>

Posted on April 16, 2013 7:38 am <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=49342> 
by Rick Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

i missed this extensive Tom Edsall piece 
<http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/04/10/in-political-campaigns-do-you-get-what-you-pay-for/?smid=tw-share> 
from last week.

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Posted in campaign finance <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10>, 
campaigns <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=59> | Comments Off

-- 
Rick Hasen
Chancellor's Professor of Law and Political Science
UC Irvine School of Law
401 E. Peltason Dr., Suite 1000
Irvine, CA 92697-8000
949.824.3072 - office
949.824.0495 - fax
rhasen at law.uci.edu
http://law.uci.edu/faculty/page1_r_hasen.html
http://electionlawblog.org

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